Search form

Search form

The rapid turnarounds of Fiat, Hewlett-Packard and Boeing all make the case that a powerful CEO can still fix a troubled company, Mark Gimein writes. Gimein argues that there is not a single recipe to a miracle turnaround, but in most cases, success comes from giving the CEO the freedom to do what is necessary and letting the person move quickly. "Murdering a major company can take many years of painstaking ineptitude," he writes. "Successfully turning it around takes much more skill but sometimes less time."

Related Summaries

To keep things running smoothly among Booz & Co.'s roughly 200 partners, CEO Shumeet Banerji spends more than two-thirds of the year traveling between the company's 59 international offices. Because the CEO of a partnership can't lead by fiat, Banerji must engage his partners. "He will ask our views and then he will challenge them and cause debate to happen like the Socratic method or a case study in business school," says a colleague.

To keep things running smoothly among Booz & Co.'s roughly 200 partners, CEO Shumeet Banerji spends more than two-thirds of the year traveling between the company's 59 international offices. Because the CEO of a partnership can't lead by fiat, Banerji must engage his partners. "He will ask our views and then he will challenge them and cause debate to happen like the Socratic method or a case study in business school," says a colleague.

To keep things running smoothly among Booz & Co.'s roughly 200 partners, CEO Shumeet Banerji spends more than two-thirds of the year traveling between the company's 59 international offices. Because the CEO of a partnership can't lead by fiat, Mr. Banerji must engage his partners. "He will ask our views and then he will challenge them and cause debate to happen like the Socratic method or a case study in business school," said a colleague.

The rapid turnarounds of Fiat, Hewlett-Packard and Boeing all make the case that a powerful CEO can still fix a troubled company, Mark Gimein writes. Gimein argues that there isn't a single recipe to a miracle turnaround, but in most cases success comes from giving the CEO the freedom to do what is necessary and letting them move quickly. "Murdering a major company can take many years of painstaking ineptitude," he writes. "Successfully turning it around takes much more skill but sometimes less time."

Sergio Marchionne, the blunt executive in charge of Fiat, launched a management cull in 2004 to cure what he said was "an organizational structure that needs to be snapped out of its stupor." In four years, he doubled Fiat's marketshare. The White House is betting he can save Chrysler, too.